Farewell to the planetary system

. In parting, Voyager 2 provided this last picture show, with Neptune’s rim in the foreground and Triton appearing as a thin crescent in the distance. The hardy spacecraft, launched in 1977, recorded the swirling face of Jupiter in July 1979, the myriad rings of Saturn in August 1981, pale Uranus in January 1986 and stormy Neptune in August 1989 before heading out of the solar system. (Courtesy of NASA and JPL.)